U.S. patent number 8,467,717 [Application Number 13/159,243] was granted by the patent office on 2013-06-18 for portable audience measurement architectures and methods for portable audience measurement.
This patent grant is currently assigned to The Nielsen Company (US), LLC. The grantee listed for this patent is David J. Croy, Paul Mears, Arun Ramaswamy. Invention is credited to David J. Croy, Paul Mears, Arun Ramaswamy.
United States Patent |
8,467,717 |
Croy , et al. |
June 18, 2013 |
Portable audience measurement architectures and methods for
portable audience measurement
Abstract
Portable audience measurement architectures and methods for
portable audience measurement are disclosed. A disclosed system
contains a plurality of portable measurement devices configured to
collect audience measurement data from media devices, a plurality
of data collection servers configured to collect audience
measurement data from the plurality of portable measurement
devices, and a central data processing server. A portable
measurement device establishes a communication link with a data
collection server in a peer-to-peer manner and transfers the
collected audience measurement data to the data collection server.
Because the portable measurement device is not dedicated to a
particular local data collection server, the portable measurement
device periodically or a periodically broadcasts a message
attempting to find a data collection server with which to establish
a communication link.
Inventors: |
Croy; David J. (Palm Harbor,
FL), Ramaswamy; Arun (Tampa, FL), Mears; Paul (Safety
Harbor, FL) |
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
Croy; David J.
Ramaswamy; Arun
Mears; Paul |
Palm Harbor
Tampa
Safety Harbor |
FL
FL
FL |
US
US
US |
|
|
Assignee: |
The Nielsen Company (US), LLC
(Schaumburg, IL)
|
Family
ID: |
56290839 |
Appl.
No.: |
13/159,243 |
Filed: |
June 13, 2011 |
Prior Publication Data
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Document
Identifier |
Publication Date |
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US 20110239245 A1 |
Sep 29, 2011 |
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Related U.S. Patent Documents
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Application
Number |
Filing Date |
Patent Number |
Issue Date |
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11457666 |
Jul 14, 2006 |
8023882 |
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PCT/US2004/000818 |
Jan 14, 2004 |
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Current U.S.
Class: |
455/2.01; 725/11;
725/13; 725/9; 725/10 |
Current CPC
Class: |
H04H
60/44 (20130101); H04N 7/17327 (20130101); H04N
21/254 (20130101); H04N 21/44222 (20130101); H04N
21/6582 (20130101); H04H 60/43 (20130101); H04H
60/37 (20130101) |
Current International
Class: |
H04H
60/21 (20080101) |
Field of
Search: |
;455/2.01
;725/9-11,13 |
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Primary Examiner: Rego; Dominic E
Attorney, Agent or Firm: Hanley, Flight & Zimmerman,
LLC
Parent Case Text
RELATED APPLICATIONS
This patent arises from a continuation of U.S. patent application
Ser. No. 11/457,666 (now U.S. Pat. No. 8,023,882), entitled
"PORTABLE AUDIENCE MEASUREMENT ARCHITECTURES AND METHODS FOR
PORTABLE AUDIENCE MEASUREMENT" which was filed on Jul. 14, 2006 and
which is a continuation of International Patent Application No.
PCT/US2004/000818, entitled "PORTABLE AUDIENCE MEASUREMENT
ARCHITECTURES AND METHODS FOR PORTABLE AUDIENCE MEASUREMENT" which
was filed on Jan. 14, 2004. U.S. patent application Ser. No.
11/457,666 and International Patent Application No.
PCT/US2004/000818 are hereby incorporated by reference in their
entirety.
Claims
What is claimed is:
1. An audience measurement architecture comprising: a first data
collection server at a first panelist location, the first data
collection server to receive and store first audience measurement
data from a first portable measurement device associated with the
first panelist location and to transmit the first audience
measurement data to a central facility; and a second data
collection server at a second location different from the first
panelist location to: automatically establish a connection with the
first portable measurement device when the first portable
measurement device is within a communication range of the second
data collection server, receive second audience measurement data
from the first portable measurement device associated with the
first panelist location, receive third audience measurement data
from a second portable measurement device associated with a second
panelist location different from the first panelist location, store
the second and third audience measurement data, and transmit the
second and third audience measurement data to the central facility,
the central facility to receive and process the first, second, and
third audience measurement data.
2. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first data collection server and the second data
collection server are networked with the central facility.
3. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first data collection server and the second data
collection server are structured to publish their capabilities to
receive audience measurement data.
4. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 3,
wherein the first portable measurement device is to publish a
capability to at least one of collect audience measurement data or
upload audience measurement data.
5. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first portable measurement device is to transmit the
first audience measurement data to the second data collection
server via a wireless connection.
6. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first portable measurement device is to transmit the
first audience measurement data to the first data collection server
after the first portable measurement device has collected a
threshold amount of audience measurement data and after the first
data collection server is detected.
7. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first audience measurement data comprises at least one
of (1) a signature of a broadcast program detected by the first
portable measurement device and (2) a code broadcast with the
broadcast program and collected by the portable measurement
device.
8. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first portable measurement device is to transmit the
first audience measurement data to the first data collection server
using an extensible markup language message.
9. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first portable measurement device is to receive the
first audience measurement data from a third portable measurement
device.
10. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first portable measurement device is to automatically
detect the second data collection server when the first portable
measurement device is within a communication range of the second
data collection server.
11. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the first data collection server is further to receive and
store fourth audience measurement data from the second portable
measurement device and to transmit the fourth audience measurement
data to the central facility.
12. An audience measurement architecture as defined in claim 1,
wherein the second data collection server is stationary.
13. A method comprising: receiving and storing first audience
measurement data from a first portable measurement device
associated with a first panelist location at a first data
collection server at the first panelist location; transmitting the
first audience measurement data from the first panelist location to
a central facility; automatically establishing a connection between
a second data collection server and the first portable measurement
device when the first portable measurement device is within a
communication range of the second data collection server, the
second data collection server being at a second location different
from the first panelist location; receiving second audience
measurement data from the first portable measurement device at the
second data collection server; receiving third audience measurement
data from a second portable measurement device associated with a
second panelist location different from the first panelist location
at the second data collection server; storing the second and third
audience measurement data at the second data collection server; and
transmitting the second and third audience measurement data from
the second data collection server to the central facility, wherein
the central facility is to receive and process the first, second,
and third audience measurement data.
14. A method as defined in claim 13 further comprising publishing
the capabilities of the second data collection server to the first
audience measurement device.
15. A method as defined in claim 13 wherein the connection is at
least one of a Wifi connection or a Bluetooth connection.
16. A method as defined in claim 13 wherein the first audience
measurement data comprises at least one of (1) a signature of a
broadcast program collected by the first portable measurement
device and (2) a code broadcast with the broadcast program and
collected by the portable measurement device.
17. A method as defined in claim 13 further comprising: receiving
and storing fourth audience measurement data from the second
portable measurement device at the first data collection server;
and transmitting the fourth audience measurement data to the
central facility.
18. An method as defined in claim 13, wherein the second data
collection server is stationary.
Description
TECHNICAL FIELD
The present disclosure pertains to audience measurement and, more
particularly, to portable audience measurement architectures and
methods for portable audience measurement.
BACKGROUND
Determining a size and demographics of a television viewing
audience helps television program producers improve their
television programming and determine a price to be charged for
advertising that is broadcasted during such programming. In
addition, accurate television viewing demographics allow
advertisers to target audiences of a desired size and/or audiences
comprising members having a set of common, desired characteristics
(e.g., income level, lifestyles, interests, etc.).
In order to collect these demographics, an audience measurement
company may enlist a number of television viewers (e.g., panelists)
to cooperate in an audience measurement study for a predefined
length of time. The viewing habits of these enlisted viewers, as
well as demographic data about these enlisted viewers, are
collected using automated and/or manual collection methods. The
collected data is subsequently used to generate a variety of
informational statistics related to television viewing audiences
including, for example, audience sizes, audience demographics,
audience preferences, the total number of hours of television
viewing per household and/or per region, etc.
The configurations of audience measurement systems vary depending
on the equipment used to receive, process, and display television
signals in each home being monitored. For example, homes that
receive cable television signals and/or satellite television
signals typically include a set top box (STB) to receive television
signals from a cable and/or a satellite television provider.
Television systems configured in this manner are typically
monitored using hardware, firmware, and/or software to interface
with the STB to extract or to generate signal information
therefrom. Such hardware, firmware, and/or software may be adapted
to perform a variety of monitoring tasks including, for example,
detecting the channel tuning status of a tuning device disposed in
the STB, extracting program identification codes embedded in
television signals tuned by the STB, generating signatures
characteristic of television signals tuned by the STB, etc. The
collected viewing and demographic data may then be transmitted to a
data collection facility for processing.
Traditional audience measurement systems have employed a
client/server architecture with the client (e.g., a metering
device) and server (e.g., a data collection unit to collect data
from the metering device) being in fixed physical locations. For
example, in a typical system, the client is located in a room in an
enlisted viewer's residence and there may be a need for multiple
clients if additional rooms in the enlisted viewer's residence are
to be monitored. The server is typically located in an off-site
location away from the enlisted viewer's residence. Also, each
client is assigned to a specific data collection server so that,
even in the case of a portable client (e.g., a metering device),
data collected by the metering device is always exported to the
same data collection server.
Typically, metering devices (e.g., a Peoplemeter) communicate with
media devices (e.g., devices to be measured such as a TV, STB,
etc.) to measure usage of the media devices. The metering devices
accumulate the viewing and demographic data and typically use a
proprietary data transfer protocol to communicate with a dedicated
data collection unit. The proprietary data transfer protocol is
non-extensible.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an example portable audience
measurement system.
FIG. 2 is a flowchart representative of example machine readable
instructions to implement the example portable measurement device
in the portable audience measurement system.
FIG. 3 is a flowchart representative of example machine readable
instructions to implement a data collection server in the example
portable audience measurement system.
FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an example computer system that may
execute the machine readable instructions represented by the
flowcharts of FIG. 2 to implement the portable audience measurement
device of FIG. 1.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an example audience measurement
architecture 100. The audience measurement architecture 100
comprises a viewing area 102, household members 104, a media device
106, portable measurement devices 108a and 108b, data collection
servers 110a, 110b, and 110c, a communication protocol 112, a
network connection 114, and a central data processing server
116.
The media device 106 may be any device that is to be measured by
the audience measurement architecture disclosed herein. As
described above, the media device 106 may be a television and/or an
audio system, but may also include a STB, a video game console or
system, advertisements, and/or a personal computer.
The viewing area 102, as shown in FIG. 1, is located within a house
which may be occupied by one or more people, referred to as
household members 104 (e.g. panelists). The viewing area 102
includes the area in which media devices (e.g., a television 106, a
STB, a radio, etc.) are being monitored, is located. In the case of
television audience monitoring shown in FIG. 1, the television 106
may be viewed by one or more household members 104 located in the
viewing area 102. Although FIG. 1 illustrates the viewing area 102
within a house, because the metering devices 108a and 108b are
portable, other viewing areas outside the house may also be
monitored. For example, if the device to be monitored is an audio
system in an automobile (e.g., a car stereo or compact disc (CD)
player), a viewing area may be an automobile and the area
surrounding the automobile. As another example, if the audience
measurement system is collecting television audience statistics,
viewing areas may include the areas around televisions outside the
house (e.g., in a restaurant, in a bar, etc.) as well as the home
viewing area 102.
The portable measurement devices 108a and 108b are devices to
collect audience measurement data from media devices 106.
Preferably, the portable measurement devices 108a and 108b are
designed to be worn or otherwise carried by the household members
104. The portable measurement devices 108a and 108b may use well
known techniques to collect the audience measurement data such as
audio code capture techniques and/or audio signature capture
techniques. The portable metering devices 108a and 108b may also be
configured to capture program identification code information or
collect audience measurement data using any other method known to a
person of ordinary skill in the art. The collected audience
measuring data may be stored in any type of storage device 320
(FIG. 4) or main memory 310 (FIG. 4) or any other device to store
the data.
The portable measurement devices 108a and 108b are also configured
to have wireless communication capabilities using an extensible
data transport protocol 112 such as Extensible Markup Language
(XML) and may also have the capabilities of discovering other
portable measurement devices 108 and/or data collection servers
110a, 110b, and/or 110c that are within a predetermined distance of
the portable measurement devices 108a and 108b (e.g., a
communication range). The wireless communication may be implemented
using any wireless protocol such as Bluetooth, 802.11b, General
Packet Radio Service (GPRS), Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA),
etc.
The data collection servers 110a, 110b, and 110c may be any device
configured to collect audience measurement data from any portable
measurement device 108a or 108b from a plurality of portable
measurement devices. The data collection servers 110a, 110b, and
110c are configured to communicate with any portable measurement
device 108a or 108b from a plurality of portable measurement
devices in a peer-to-peer manner using any wireless communication
protocol and/or standard. The data collection servers 110a, 110b,
and 110c may be located anywhere (e.g., in a viewing area 102, in a
home, outside of a home, in a restaurant, in a bar, outside, on a
telephone pole or a cellular phone tower, etc.) and are situated to
receive and store the audience measurement data from the portable
measuring devices 108a and 108b. The data collection servers 110a,
110b, and 110c are typically stationary servers configured to
communicate with the central data processing server 116 and a
plurality of portable measurement devices (e.g., portable
measurement devices 108a and 108b). The geographical location and
the communication range of each data collection server 110a, 110b,
and 110c may be known by the central data processing server 116 and
the geographical location/proximity of a portable measurement
device 108a and/or 108b may be determined from the reporting data
collection server's location. For example, if the central data
processing server 116 receives data from data collection server
110a, it may determine that portable measurement device 108a has
been in the geographical or network proximity of the data
collection server 110a. When the portable measurement devices 108a
and 108b are within the communication range of at least one of the
data collection servers 110a, 110b, and 110c, a communication link
(e.g., a network connection) is established via the communication
protocol 112 and the portable measurement devices 108a and 108b may
transmit audience measurement data to the data collection server
110a, 110b, and 110c. The data collection servers 110a, 110b, and
110c may process, store, and/or transmit the audience measurement
data to the central data processing server 116 via the network
connection 114. The data collection servers 110a, 110b, and 110c
may also be configured to detect the portable measurement devices
108a and 108b and indicate the data collection servers' ability to
receive audience measurement data.
The portable measurement devices 108a and 108b may detect the data
collection servers 110 (e.g., the data collection servers 110a,
110b, 110c, and/or other data collection servers not shown in FIG.
2) and/or other portable measurement devices 108 by broadcasting a
query message. The query message may identify and/or publish the
portable measurement device's capabilities such as the
communication protocol 112, the ability to collect and/or receive
audience measurement data, and/or the ability to transfer audience
measurement data. Alternatively, the query message may be a message
probing a local network for data collection servers 110 and/or
searching for a network to join. Although the portable measurement
devices 108a and 108b are able to communicate with any data
collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c, each portable measurement
device 108a or 108b is associated with a viewing area 102, a data
collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c in the home of the household
members 104 or located elsewhere, and/or household members 104.
The communication protocol 112 may be any extensible data transport
protocol such as XML and/or XML Web Services. In the illustrated
example, the communication protocol 112 is a non-proprietary
protocol that allows devices such as the data collection servers
110a, 110b, and 110c and the portable measurement devices 108a and
108b to communicate with one another in a global or localized
manner (e.g. a peer-to-peer network). The communication protocol
112 may be implemented via a wireless network protocol such as
Bluetooth, 802.11b and/or an infrared (IR) connection.
The network connection 114 may be implemented using any type of
public or private network such as, but not limited to, the
Internet, an intranet, a telephone network, a local area network
(LAN), a cable network, and/or a wireless peer-to-peer network. The
network connection 114 allows for the data collection servers 110a,
110b, and 110c to communicate with one another, with the central
data processing server 116 and/or with other devices which may be
connected through the network connection 114 such as a personal
computer.
The central data processing server 116 is a device that collects
audience measurement data from the data collection servers 110a,
110b, and 110c via the network connection 114. The central data
processing server 116 may store and/or process the data received
from the data collection servers 110a, 110b, and 110c. Typically,
the central data processing server 116 processes the received data
into reports that may be sold to interested parties.
A typical scenario in which a portable measurement device 108a or
108b is used may be similar to the following example. In this
example, it is assumed that the viewing area 102 is a room in a
house, including a television 106, and the portable measurement
device 108a is associated with the viewing area 102. It is also
assumed the portable measurement device 108a is configured to
collect audience measurement data from the television 106.
The household member 104 watching the television 106 places the
portable measurement device 108a in the viewing area 102. The
portable measurement device 108a collects signatures of television
programs and/or advertisements shown on the television 106 and/or
codes broadcast with the television program and/or advertisements.
Subsequently, the household member 104, may move the portable
measurement device 108a to a first location outside of the viewing
area 102 such as a second room in the house containing a data
collection server 110a. If so, the portable measurement device 108a
may detect the data collection server 110a and may determine that
enough audience measurement data has been collected. If so, it
uploads the audience measurement data to the data collection server
110a. The data collection server 110a may communicate with the
portable measurement device 108a when the portable measurement
device 108a is present in the house (irrespective of which room)
and within the communication range of the data collection server
110a. This may be implemented by a wireless network in the house
which is well known to those of ordinary skill in the art. The data
collection server 110a may be able to use a signal strength from
the portable measurement device 108a to determine where in the
house the portable measurement device 108a is located.
Subsequently, the household member 104 may carry the portable
measurement device 108a back to the viewing area 102. The portable
measurement device 108a then collects additional audience
measurement data from the television 106. The household member 104
may then carry the portable measurement device 108a to a second
location outside of the viewing area 102, such as a grocery store.
If the second location (or a location between the first and second
location (e.g., a telephone pole on the street or in a parking lot)
contains a data collection server 110b, the portable measurement
device 108a may detect the data collection server 110b and upload
the audience measurement data to the data collection server 110b if
a predetermined amount of audience measurement data has been
collected.
FIGS. 2 and 3 are flowcharts representative of example machine
readable instructions which may be executed by a portable
measurement device 108 to implement an example method of audience
measurement. Preferably, the illustrated processes 200 and 250 are
embodied in one or more software or firmware programs which are
stored in one or more memories (e.g., flash memory 312 and/or hard
disk 320) and executed by one or more processors (e.g., processor
306) in a well known manner. However, some or all of the blocks of
the processes 200 and 250 may be performed manually and/or by some
other device. Although the processes 200 and 250 are described with
reference to the flowchart illustrated in FIGS. 2 and 3, a person
of ordinary skill in the art will readily appreciate that many
other methods of performing the processes 200 and 250 may be used.
For example, the order of many of the blocks may be altered, the
operation of one or more blocks may be changed, blocks may be
combined, and/or blocks may be eliminated.
In general, the example process 200 begins when a portable
measurement device 108 (e.g., the portable measurement devices 108a
and/or 108b of FIG. 2 or other portable measurement devices not
shown) collects audience measurement data from a media device 106.
Subsequently, the portable measurement device 108 attempts to
detect a data collection server 110. If the portable measurement
device 108 detects a data collection server 110 and a predetermined
amount of audience measurement data has been collected, the
audience measurement data stored in the portable measurement device
108 is uploaded to the data collection server 110. Otherwise, the
portable measurement device 108 waits a predetermined amount of
time and then attempts to detect a data collection server 110. In
this way, the portable measurement device 108 is able to export its
collected data to any of several data collection servers 110a,
110b, and 110c as the portable measurement device 108 is
transported from place to place.
More specifically, the process 200 of FIG. 2 begins when a portable
measurement device 108a gathers audience measurement data (block
202). The portable measurement device 108a may collect audience
measurement data from any type of media device 106, such as a
television, a radio, billboards broadcasting an identifier and a
map correlating the user's position to a known advertisement
location such as billboard advertisements, and/or a personal
computer. Examples of the audience measurement data to be
collected, may include, but is not limited to signatures of a
broadcast program (e.g., radio and/or television programming and/or
advertisements), identification codes within the broadcast program
(e.g., watermarked data in radio and/or television broadcasts
and/or digital codes embedded within video frames of a program or
advertisement), and/or channel tuning information. The audience
measurement data may also include survey or prompt information.
Methods to collect the audience measurement data are well known in
the art and, thus, will not be described here.
After the audience measurement data has been collected by the
portable measurement device 108a, a household member 104 may carry
the portable measurement device 108a or the portable measurement
device 108a may be otherwise moved to a new location (e.g., outside
the home, into a separate room, etc.) (block 204). In the example
of FIG. 1, a data collection server 110a is located in the home of
the audience member 104 associated with the portable metering
device 108a. Therefore, when the portable measurement device 108 is
moved a sufficient distance, it will move beyond the communication
range of the server 110a. As a result of the portable measurement
device 108a being outside the communication range of the data
collection server 110a, a wireless communication link (e.g., a
network connection using the communication protocol 112) between
the data collection server 110a and the portable measurement device
108a is lost. Persons of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate,
however, that there may not be a data collection server 110a
located in the home or the viewing area 102.
Irrespective of the location of the server 110a, when the portable
measurement device 108a detects the lost communication link 112, it
attempts to establish a wireless communication link (e.g.,
discovered) with any available data collection server 110a by
broadcasting a query message (block 206). The data collection
server 110a may be discovered through commonly known protocols
and/or the network identity of the collection servers 110a (e.g., a
domain name and/or an Internet protocol address) may be stored in
the portable measurement device 108a. The query message is
transmitted using a communication protocol 112 as described above.
The query message may be a message publishing the portable
measurement device's capabilities (e.g., a wireless communication
protocol, collecting audience measurement data, ability to transfer
the collected audience measurement data, etc.) or a message
searching for a network to join.
If a data collection server 110a, 110b, and 110c is in the
communication range of the portable measurement device 108a and
receives the query message, the data collection server 110a, 110b,
and 110c responds and a wireless communication link is established
between the data collection server 110a, 110b, and 110c and the
portable measurement device 108a (block 208). The portable
measurement device 108a then transfers the collected audience
measurement data to the data collection server 110a, 110b, and 110c
(block 210) using the communication protocol 112. Control then
returns to block 210.
Although not shown in FIG. 2, after the collected audience
measurement data is transferred to the data collection server 110a,
110b, and 110c (block 210), the data collection server 110a, 110b,
and 110c may transfer the collected audience measurement data to a
central collection server 116 and explained below in connection
with FIG. 3.
Returning to block 208, if no data collection server 110 responds
to the query message (block 208), the portable measurement device
108a waits a predetermined amount of time (block 212). The
predetermined amount of time may be dynamically adjusted, set by a
user, or determined in software. After the predetermined amount of
time has elapsed (block 212), control returns to block 206 and the
portable measurement device 108a again attempts to find a data
collection server 110 by broadcasting the query message. This
attempt may be successful if, for example, the device 108a has been
moved to a location within the communication range of a data
collection server 110a, 110b, and/or 110c.
FIG. 3 represents a program that may be executed by a data
collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c. In general, the example
process 250 of FIG. 3 begins by the data collection server 110a,
110b, or 110c searching for a query message broadcast by a portable
measurement device 108a or 108b. If a query message is detected,
the data collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c acknowledges the
query message and establishes a wireless communication link with
the portable measurement device 108a and/or 108b that broadcast the
query message to publish its ability to receive an audience
measurement data upload. After a wireless communication link is
established, the data collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c
receives audience measurement data from the portable measurement
device 108a or 108b. The data collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c
then waits for additional query messages and/or audience
measurement data from the portable measurement device 108a and/or
108b and/or processes or transfers the audience measurement data
that has been already received.
More specifically, the process of FIG. 3 begins when a data
collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c searches for a query message
broadcast from a portable measurement device 108a or 108b (block
252). If no query message is detected (block 252), control returns
to block 252 and the data collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c
continues to search for a query message.
If a query message is detected (block 252), the data collection
server 110a, 110b, or 110c responds to the query message (block
254) and creates a wireless communication link with the portable
measurement device 108a or 108b (block 255). The data collection
server 110a, 110b, or 110c may respond to the query message by
sending an acknowledgement message or some other message to inform
the portable measurement device 108a or 108b of the presence and
capabilities of the data collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c. The
acknowledgment message is transmitted using the communication
protocol 112 as described above.
After the wireless communication link is established (block 255),
the data collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c collects audience
measurement data from the portable measurement device 108a or 108b
(block 256). The audience measurement data is transmitted from the
portable measurement device 108a or 108b using the communication
protocol 112.
After the audience measurement data is received by the data
collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c (block 256), the data
collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c may transfer the collected
audience measurement data to the central data processing server 116
(block 257). The collected audience measurement data may be
transferred as it is received by the data collection server 110a,
110b, or 110c or may be stored and transferred at a later time. The
data collection server 110a, 110b, or 110c then waits for another
query message and/or additional audience measurement data from the
portable measurement device 108a or 108b (block 258).
Although the above examples illustrate only two portable
measurement devices 108a and 108b, persons of ordinary skill in the
art will readily appreciate that any number of portable measurement
devices may be employed. Similarly, although only portable
measurement devices 108a and 108b are discussed above, persons of
ordinary skill in the art will appreciated that the system 100 may
employ fixed measurement devices (not shown) in addition to the
portable measurement devices. Moreover, although only three data
collection servers 110a, 110b, and 110c are shown in the above
example, a person of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that
any number of such servers may be employed. For example, additional
data collection servers may be used in areas with large data
traffic loads. Similarly, although only data collection servers
110a, 110b, or 110c employing an extensible language are disclosed
above, persons of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that
some of the servers may be traditional dedicated servers adapted to
collect data from fixed or otherwise dedicated metering
devices.
FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an example processor system 300 that
may be used to implement the methods and architecture for the
disclosed portable metering device 108a and 108b. The example
processor system 300 may be similar to a personal computer (PC), a
handheld computer, or any other computing device. In the
illustrated example, the example processor system 300 includes a
main processing unit 302 powered by a power supply 304. The main
processing unit 302 may include a processor 306 electrically
coupled by a system interconnect 308 to a main memory device 310, a
flash memory device 312, and one or more interface circuits 314.
The system interconnect 308 may be an address/data bus. Of course,
a person of ordinary skill in the art will readily appreciate that
interconnects other than busses may be used to connect the
processor 306 to the other devices 310, 312, and 314. For example,
one or more dedicated lines and/or a crossbar may be used to
connect the processor 306 to the other devices 310, 312, and
314.
The processor 306 may be any type of well known processor, such as
a processor from the Intel Pentium.RTM. family of microprocessors,
the Intel Itanium.RTM. family of microprocessors, the Intel
Centrino.RTM. family of microprocessors, and/or the Intel
XScale.RTM. family of microprocessors. In addition, the processor
306 may include any type of well known cache memory, such as static
random access memory (SRAM). The main memory device 310 may include
dynamic random access memory (DRAM) and/or any other form of random
access memory. For example, the main memory device 310 may include
double data rate random access memory (DDRAM). The main memory
device 310 may also include non-volatile memory. In an example, the
main memory device 310 stores a software program which is executed
by the processor 306 in a well known manner. The flash memory
device 312 may be any type of flash memory device. The flash memory
device 312 may store firmware used to boot the portable metering
device 300.
The interface circuit(s) 314 may be implemented using any type of
well known interface standard, such as an Ethernet interface and/or
a Universal Serial Bus (USB) interface. One or more input devices
316 may be connected to the interface circuits 314 for entering
data and commands into the main processing unit 302. For example,
the input device 316 may be a keypad, mouse, touch screen, track
pad, track ball, and/or a voice recognition system.
One or more displays, speakers, and/or other output devices 318 may
also be connected to the main processing unit 302 via one or more
of the interface circuits 314. The display 318 may be a liquid
crystal displays (LCD), light emitting diode (LED) display, or any
other type of display. The display 318 may generate visual
indications of data generated during operation of the main
processing unit 302. The visual indications may include prompts for
human operator input, calculated values, detected data, etc.
The example processor system 300 may also include one or more
storage devices 320. For example, the portable metering device 300
may include one or more hard drives, a compact disk (CD) drive, a
digital versatile disk drive (DVD), and/or other computer media
input/output (I/O) devices.
The example processor system 300 may also exchange data with other
devices 322 via a connection to a network 324. The network
connection may be any type of network connection, such as an
Ethernet connection, a wireless network connection, a cellular data
line, etc. The network 324 may be any type of network, such as the
Internet, a cellular network, a cable network, and/or a wireless
peer-to-peer network. Data may be exchanged using an extensible
data transport such as XML and/or XML Web Services or may be
exchanged using some other known communication protocol.
Because the hardware configuration of a server is well known, it is
not separately shown. However, persons of ordinary skill in the art
will appreciate that the data collection servers 110 may be
implemented using hardware such as that shown in FIG. 4. Typically,
the hardware of the server 110 will be more robust than the
hardware of the portable data collection device 108, because the
servers 110 do not face the portability constraints of the portable
devices 108.
Although the above discloses example systems including, among other
components, software executed on hardware, it should be noted that
such systems are merely illustrative and should not be considered
as limiting. For example, it is contemplated that any or all of the
disclosed hardware and software components could be embodied
exclusively in dedicated hardware, exclusively in software,
exclusively in firmware or in some combination of hardware,
firmware and/or software.
In addition, although certain methods, apparatus, and articles of
manufacture have been described herein, the scope of coverage of
this patent is not limited thereto. On the contrary, this patent
covers all apparatus, methods and articles of manufacture fairly
falling within the scope of the appended claims either literally or
under the doctrine of equivalents.
* * * * *
References